Unspoken
by 93 Bright Lights
Summary: Feelings that become deeper than just attraction. When feelings become so intense, they consume you.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: Liam and Annie, unfortunately, do not belong to me.  
A collection of Liam/Annie summer moments to get me through the summer hiatus. If you want me to continue, **reviews** would be appreciated. I might just continue anyway - the writing is a great way to distract myself. But, all in all, just short, sweet chapters, and the next couple will be more focused on particular events.

* * *

No one can ever know. The depth of the emotion she feels when she is around him. She, herself, doesn't understand. At any moment she has an overwhelming urge to call him, to talk to him. And, more often than not, she succumbs. She'll call him, sometimes during the day, sometimes at night, but phone calls don't suffice, not for Liam. No, he always asks her to meet him, in the park, at the beach, In his shed.

There is never an awkward silence anymore. There used to be, initially, a silence full of waiting. Now their silence is a peaceful stillness, brimming with words and no need to express themselves with sounds. She understands him completely.

He makes her _feel_. She cannot pinpoint the sensation, because it isn't just a feeling. It's more complex than that. What they are to each other goes further than sexual tension, or an attraction to his mischievous good looks and handsome physique, although they can merit any girl's gaze. It's the constant humming in her ears that says his name, the countdown in her mind that starts whenever they walk away from each other, and reaches zero the minute he is once again in her sight.

He looks for any excuse to touch her. She knows this, and enjoys it more than she should. Every time he caresses her cheek, when submerged in their flowing conversations, or strokes her hair, it's electricity. Initially, she pulled away, but now it's just another of their unspoken secrets. She lets every wall, every _guard_ of hers drop, except this one. Because she knows if it starts, it can never stop.

And it cannot start. Naomi is her friend. She is self-centered, proud, vain yet she is also an influential and caring ally. Furthermore, Annie knows what it is like to be up against the force that is Naomi.

Summer just started two weeks ago and yet she cannot remember a time before, unless it is in her nightmares. The best news is, there is so much of summer left. With Liam's encouragement, she had faced the fear that had haunted her for a full year. He held her hand when she confessed at the station, took her into his arms when she was told the date for her hearing, and whispered promises to take her there himself, in the midst of his intense embrace. And who else would? Her brother disappeared, as did her father, her mother still with her but in a deep depression. And so, with over a month until her court appearance, the days were the times to enjoy before the night still haunted her, sometimes with Joe Herman, other times with the never ending lack of her father. To make it worse, the only time the nightmares stop is when she spends the night with him.

It's nothing _more_ than friendly – to an onlooker. She'll drift into and out of sleep on an old sofa he brought into his shed, and he'll wrap a blanket around her and recline next to her, with enough space between them to be completely innocent. But, tap into their thoughts and it's a different story entirely. He doesn't sleep in his bedroom anymore – in fact, his bedroom is bare of all the possessions he thought important enough to take with him. His workshed is the place for sleeping, when he isn't working on a new boat. She tries to help, but what does she know about nautical engineering? Nothing of course, yet still, he considers all of her suggestions with a smile and a wink, as if they bear importance to him. Which, in terms of sentimental value, they do. Because anything Annie says is of importance to him. It's her company that doesn't drive him crazy, instead that drives him to wake up every morning. And the mornings where he wakes up next to her serene body, hearing her deep breathing, are the best.


	2. Sunrise

So I had one of those moments where I thought about the couple, and then a page just wrote itself. Here is a speedy update.

* * *

Just after midnight, she gets a call, a local unknown number. Liam? He just left her, less than an hour ago, to tell her parents about the accident. And he also told her he was there for her, to pick up any pieces she left behind, though in not so many words.

"I need you to come pick me up. I'm at the station and I don't know who else to call."

She was there in 11 minutes, according to her car's analogue clock. She bailed him out, no questions asked, until back in her car. As he told her of his former boat, now a charred and blackened remnant of the once white, beautiful vessel he labored over for the more than a year, his eyes shone. She wasn't certain whether they shone with unshed tears, or with the few precious memories of the finished boat. But, for whatever tears he held back, she compensated for with her own.

And even as he recalls to her at how he lost his temper, how he beat her former boyfriend and stalker to a bloody mess, she keeps her hand clasped on his shaking wrist, never letting go, never even momentarily exerting less pressure. She makes an internal promise not to visit Jasper in hospital – _Hell_, not to talk to him, look at him, or acknowledge him. He had inflicted more pain on Liam than any amount of physical pain, and it was for this, more than the stalking, or the lying, or the manipulating, that she could never forgive him.

She drives to the car park of the now deserted pier, and they begin to talk, looking straight ahead without risking eye contact. When she asks him why it was her that he called, he tells her of his break-up with Naomi, and she tries to show no reaction. But there are sirens in her head, colouring her vision red and telling her to get out now. But like any half-decent masochist, she remains with him in this painful equilibrium between desire and comfort. He didn't answer her question. She asks him again why it _was_ _her, _not why it _wasn't_ Naomi. He turns his head now, and after a moment of wonderfully intense stare she falters and looks down, unable to hold his gaze.

She then tells him of her parents' reaction – they were shocked, but final understanding of her behaviour in the past year helped them a lot. They told her to go to the station and make a confession, but, on the verge of breaking down, she tells him of their decision not to accompany her. He immediately takes control, and all of a sudden _he_ is holding _her_, albeit awkwardly across the gap between the car seats. He promises she won't be alone; he will make sure of this.

Tears and angst fade away as she tells him of Dixon's escape to Australia, and there is laughter and bids of 'good luck' to Dixon, though he cannot hear their encouraging words, which heralds more of her laughter. She is not upset anymore, yet he still holds her nearest shoulder, squeezing tightly once in a while which sends unexpected jolts to her toes. They smile and talk, with minimal moments of silence, until the sky reaches a powder blue hue and the sun surfaces slightly above the water, across the vest expanse of ocean that reminds them of water they won't be sailing on.


	3. Sunset

Apologies for the wait, I've had other things on my mind. Plus, my allocated Annie-Liam times were taken up by the excitement of reaching **100 threads!** over on FanForum, so hugs to my lovely friends over there, where our incessant posting about anything and everything made it possible. ;) P.S. Not exactly my best work, this update is a bit fluffy with no plot,but thats pretty much what I intended this to be - just snippets of Lannie moments, drivel, and the LA equivalent to pillow talk. I'll have a deeper moment coming next though, what with her police confession.

* * *

She didn't want to call him. She didn't want to see him because she wanted it too much. But he wakes her up with a knock at her door, regardless, and with no prior warning. He promises her this day of disregard and forgetting, to compensate for the worries of the night before. Tomorrow, we'll go to the station, he assures her. But today, they will be as far from the place as possible.

And what point of interest is furthest away from the station? He drives her along the Pacific Coast Highway, and when asked where they're heading, he just smiles a secret smile. And when he says he doesn't know, his eyes express the freedom of this spontaneity as if it is the most natural instinct in the world. Small talk ensues, though they are more conscientious today, not disoriented by their sentiments toward one another, as was last night's case.

He makes a turn, finally, into a clearing under the tip of the jutting headland, and by this time, its late afternoon. Out of the car, down the steps and onto a portion of the beach that looks untouched by any force except nature, and the sheer beauty of their surroundings renders both of them speechless for a prolonged amount of time. She's soaking in every sense that is being heightened – there is a glimmer of sun her eyes catch as she watches the undulating ocean waves; she can feel a_ cool _breeze in the wind, due to the slight shade the headland brings, which she can't recall since her days in Kansas. She asks Liam how he knew this place, and with equal amazement in his eyes, he tells her that he doesn't. "Just took the initiative and turned."

As they walk closer towards the waves, the sand is a dark, damp golden, and he pulls off his leather jacket and sets it on the floor, so she can sit without wet sand attaching itself to her sundress. Her feet, now bare, rest on the sand, and the combs in the waves are reaching out to tickle her toes. Who knew, twenty-four hours ago, what would become of his boat, and of her best-kept, worst secret. At this moment, who even cared? She feels like a child again, reminiscent of her spontaneous fountain-jumping, which Liam teases her about now.

"Feel like getting wet again? You had no inhibitions last time." She laughs and shakes her head, but he fills his palms with water and carries it over, teasingly threatening.

"_You wouldn't dare."_

The moment this leaves her lips, she feels the cool water soak through the rim of her sundress, over her bare legs underneath and yelps.

A sweet and unexpected water fight follows, and as the sun sets, they settle down, exhausted and she brushes the crystallized salt off her legs. He apologizes for starting the debacle, but she brushes his apology away just as easily. She was the catalyst, when she 'dared' him.

"Plus, the salt-sand mixture is great for exfoliating my legs." She can't stop the laugh that follows as he raises a questioning eyebrow. But she notices him staring the spot of her thigh she was 'exfoliating', just as he realizes this of himself also. Shaking his head, as if to say 'crazy girl', but also to rid his head of any unbecoming thoughts, he looks to the orange horizon.

"You know, this is the same sun we saw rise."

"Liam. It's the sun. There's only one. It's always the same." And she giggles. "But I know what you mean." The same _cycle_.

He declares it to be 'pretty damn cool' which she understand has a lot more meaning than his words convey, given his somewhat restricted emotional vocabulary.

She doesn't want to leave, but she is the one to say they should get going before her parents think she's disappeared, having not seen them all day. A 'thank you' for the day simply would not suffice, so she encases her little arms around him. He radiates warmth, and he squeezes her petite body under his, an understanding of her thanks. Side to side, not touching but bumping into each other slightly, they make their way to his car, and he guarantees that if only one thing is certain about the future, it is that they'll find their way to their clearing once again.


End file.
